Month: July 2020

Today was my character’s birthday, and Agent S appeared outside my house to kidnap me. I ended up at her house, where she, Keaton, and Hornsby wished me a happy birthday.

Spoiler warning. If you haven’t experienced your birthday in New Horizons yet, and you want everything to be a surprise, you may want to skip today’s blog entry. Otherwise, feel free to continue.

Agent S told me to make a wish and blow out my birthday candles, so I did. She gave a present from the three of them; it was some party flooring. Next, I was given a stick and told to beat up a pinata! I whacked it repeatedly, and eventually cupcakes fell out!

There were ten of them; I ate one and held on to the rest.

I returned home and checked my mail. Mom sent me a birthday letter, with “Mom’s homemade cake” attached. I realized Nook’s Cranny was about to close, so I rushed there. Just before getting kicked out, I was able to buy the throwback rocket and colorful wheel. This version of the wheel resembles the wheel in Desert Island Escape.

At the plaza, I was quite surprised to see K.K. Slider here! I was wondering why they keep bouncing him around from Saturday to Sunday to Friday. And then I realized he was here because of my birthday. So he performed K.K. Birthday for me (and Tybalt). But the weird part is that birthday letters appeared on-screen as he sang!

These were not letters I received in the mail, so it’s a bit confusing as to why they’re popping up in the air as K.K. sang. But I had “letters” from Agent S, Rizzo, Blathers, and Orville. It was nice, I just don’t understand it. 😛

There was a tent at the campsite, and I was wondering if I would have a great camper to adopt. But instead, I found Tiffany inside.

She was wearing a tuxedo dress, which seems like a weird article of clothing on its own…and an even weirder thing to wear while camping. 😛

I went around town, offering cupcakes to my villagers. They would typically give me a birthday present in return.

Here’s a list of what they gave:

• Louie: birthday cake
• Lopez: birthday table
• Tia: birthday hat
• Keaton: birthday sign
• Midge: birthday shades
• Hornsby: birthday candles
• Apple: party wall
• Rizzo: cycling shirt

Leave it to Rizzo to break up the birthday gift trend. 😛 I couldn’t give one to Tybalt or Agent S because they were sitting down (Tybalt at K.K.’s show, Agent S in the chair by her house).

But I had a good time overall. The pinata and cupcakes were a surprise to me, and it’s nice to get these birthday items. I’ll keep them in storage.

Have a good night, everyone! I’ll be back with another entry tomorrow, so I’ll see you then!

Late last night, I tested out the dreaming function for myself. I visited Daniel’s town of Outset at dream address 6987-5499-2084. It’s a beautiful town with lots of flowers, great scenery, and a really good lineup of villagers (including some of my favorites like Savannah, Butch, and Drago).

Daniel also has some great rooms, and I particularly loved this space arcade. The stars on the wallpaper move, as if the arcade was inside a really fast-moving spaceship.

As for my own dream island, I actually got a violation from Nintendo! I had previously set my blog address as the comment on my passport…and in dreams, that comment shows up as something your character says. So Nintendo deleted my dream and gave me a warning!

So be careful about using your blog, site, or social media on your passport or bulletin board! I don’t know if someone actually reported my town, or if Nintendo detected the address automatically, but beware!

I changed my comment and re-uploaded my dream once the new day began. Fortunately, I still have the same dream address.

Later on this evening, I checked my mail. I had a letter from Luna, and she sent me a “Dream Bell exchange ticket.” At first, I was wondering if this opened up something new…but apparently not. It can be sold for 5,000 bells, and it’s basically your “reward” for uploading your dream (or perhaps for having a dream visitor?). This is is basically the same as Luna giving you 5,000 bells for updating your dream in New Leaf. You just have to wait until the next day to get it.

C.J. was in town today, and I easily completed his challenge of catching any five fish in a row. I then grabbed most of my sharks from storage, and sold a bunch of fish to C.J.; he gave me nearly 135k for everything.

Celeste showed up tonight, and she gave me a D.I.Y. recipe for a Leo sculpture. I made one, and it’s a wall-mounted item.

Additional Thoughts on Dreaming

As someone who loved the Dream Suite feature in New Leaf, it’s only natural for me to compare the dreaming in New Horizons to the dreaming in New Leaf. And here are some differences I’ve noticed:

• You can view bulletin board posts left by town residents in New Horizons (but you couldn’t in New Leaf). On one hand, you’ll want to be careful about what you post. But used correctly, this can be a very helpful tool to explain things to dreamers, or let them know what to look for.
• Dreamers do not change into pajamas in dreams. They wear whatever clothes they already had on.
• You can not search for dream towns by town or name.
• You can not visit random towns. You need the dream address.
• Lloid is not present to allow dreamers to borrow tools. So if your town requires ladders or vaulting poles, you’ll need to leave them out in town somewhere.
• You can’t see your dreamer count or latest dreamer in-game. But apparently, you can see them by using the Nintendo Switch Online app. I don’t see why a smartphone should be required to access this information, when New Leaf showed it in-game…but that’s how Nintendo works these days.

Dreaming is a great feature and an excellent addition to the game. But when you compare it to the Dream Suite in New Leaf, the ACNH dreaming system seems rushed and unfinished. Perhaps it will be improved in future updates, but it could be argued that they should have waited another month or two (until the autumn update) to do it right. What do you think?

I’ll be back tomorrow with another entry. But FYI, there will be no Friday Night Forest this week. It should return next week, though.

Yesterday, Gulliver sent me my latest reward for helping him out. It was a sombrero. That’s better than the pigtail he sent me last time, but I’m just getting disappointed that so many of his items are hats or accessories instead of furniture. In the older games, he gave out nothing but exclusive furniture.

Today, I saw a bug on a tree that looked different. So I got my net out and caught my first cicada shell!

I went diving to find a scallop, and Pascal had these words of wisdom about flowers. This is one of his better sayings in New Horizons, in my opinion.

But unfortunately, he only gave me another pearl for the scallop.

Nintendo announced that the latest summer update will be released July 30th, which is tomorrow. (But it’s actually available early…as in right now!) Watch this if you haven’t seen it yet:

Dreaming is returning! Even though Luna doesn’t have her own building (the Dream Suite) this time, we’ll still be able to upload our islands and visit dream versions of other towns, like we could in New Leaf. I’ve placed a frog costume in my town, so that dreamers can dress as frogs while hopping across the frog race course.

I downloaded the update tonight, which is version 1.4.0. I had two new letters my mailbox: The first one was from Nintendo, thanking me for downloading the update. A fireworks-show wall was attached. This is what it looks like:

The other letter was from Luna, telling me about the dreaming. All we have to do is lie in a bed to start the process. She attached Luna’s bed to the letter, so you’ll be all set even if you didn’t have a bed already.

One word of warning though: The game warns that the information in your town…including bulletin board posts…will be shared with visitors. Bulletin board posts were not shared in New Leaf, so it may be something to keep in mind if you (or a family member) posts anything personal that you don’t want the world to see.

Another great feature is that the photo app now allows you to turn off the HUD (heads-up display) guide when taking photos and videos! No glitch required! Finally! Just press the R stick to turn it on or off. 🙂 🙂

After Nintendo’s maintenance period ended, I uploaded my dream! My dream address is 6717-1633-3682. Check it out!

Louie asked me to make a delivery to Hornsby, so I agreed to help out. The item was a rugby shirt, which Hornsby wasn’t sure about at first. But once he tried it on, he seemed to like it. For helping out, he gave me a tube top…the same item he gave me on Sunday!

Enjoy the update, and I hope you enjoy your dream visits to Forest! Forest looks better in the daylight, so I’ll update it again soon with a daytime version. See you next time!